Let’s get surgical!

2018-10-27

Last time we spoke I was updating you on my midsummer myomectomy which went really well and the recovery wasn’t bad at all outside the first few weeks. I went back to work around Labor Day and things were going swimmingly for the month of September. Work was busy (how I like it), school was stupidly busy and a bit overwhelming (bleh), I had been helping a lot with some local political issues. Things were going fairly well… then October happened, and this happened:

First we thought it was just a sprain, then maybe we thought I had torn a ligament or my meniscus, but it turns out I ripped off some cartilage from my kneecap in the process of dislocating it. I wish I had a cool story about how I was skateboarding or skiing or something more exciting than “carrying political yard signs to my car” but alas. I was fighting the good fight and destroyed my knee instead.

So in case one surgery wasn’t enough for 2018, let there be two. Thursday I went in to have the cartilage repaired and they ended up having to graft it to try to get it to regrow because if there’s anything I’m really good at it, it’s fucking things up.

I won’t bore you with the details of this one because it was outpatient and I was home by noon but the nature of the surgery has one huuuuge drawback: I can’t bend my leg for at least four weeks.

Four weeks!

If you surveyed everyone who knows me and asked them one defining personality trait about me, I would wager to guess that most of them would have “independent” listed. My whole life I have been little Miss Independent; somewhat out of necessity, somewhat out of choice. I’ve always preferred to do things my way and I have a hard time trusting others enough to depend on them.

Yesterday morning I couldn’t lift my own leg high enough to get back on the couch after being in so much pain I hobbled across the house to get more medication. I cried my face off and had to call my dad to come help me lay back down. I can’t get up on my own. I can’t lay down on my own. I can’t shower. I can’t drive. I can’t do much other than lay here and watch television through sleepy eyes.

This is so hard for me.

It’s torture resigning myself to the fact that for a little while, I’m just going to be fully dependent on other people. At some point, hopefully in the next few days after the surgical pain wears off, I’ll feel good enough to walk and I’ll get some of my independence back but I’ll still need help with a lot of other things and that sucks.

I am thankful I have wonderful people in my life – a live-in boyfriend and family close by who have all stepped up extra to look after me – and friends who have offered up lots of help. It takes a village to raise an independent lady with a bum knee. Here’s to 2019 having a lot fewer doctor’s visits!